Lord McKenzie of Luton: The information requested falls within the responsibilities of the National Statistician who has been asked to reply.
	Letter from the National Statistician, Karen Dunnell, dated 12 December 2006.
	As National Statistician I have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question concerning what percentage of staff currently employed in each government department are registered as disabled people; and what the comparable figures were for each of the last five years (HL 26).
	Diversity statistics are published annually in the Civil Service Statistics report on the Cabinet Office website. The latest publication, for 2005, presents statistics on permanent staff in post for all staff and Senior Civil Service level by department and disability status.
	http://www.civilservice.gov.uk/management/statistics/publications/xls/report_2005/table_p.xls
	Comparable statistics have been prepared on an ad hoc basis for 2003 and 2004 and have been placed in the House of Lords Library.
	For earlier years, statistics on disability status are available only by responsibility level and Government Office for the Regions. Links are provided to the relevant tables. Information by department could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
	Please note that information on disability is collected on voluntary, self-classification questionnaires and there is considerable non-response. For example, in April 2005, the disability status of 26 per cent of staff was unknown. Non-response particularly affects those moving between departments. Therefore, the statistics on disability should be interpreted with some caution, particularly year-on-year changes.